Minerva Anestesiologica 2010 April;76(4):266-75

REVIEWS

Abdominal organ transplantation

Niemann C. U., Eilers H.

1 Department of Anesthesia and Perioperative Care, University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA;2 Department of Surgery, Division of Transplantation, University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA

The improvement in the success of solid organ transplantation over the past decades is remarkable and well documented. It is now a well-accepted treatment modality for patients with end-stage organ disease. Within the field of transplantation, abdominal organ transplantation is significantly more common than thoracic transplantation. Abdominal organ transplantation includes kidney, liver, pancreas, and combinations of abdominal organs. The most frequently transplanted organs are kidney and liver, which account together for more than 70% of all transplanted organs. For this limited review, it is impossible to cover all organ systems in abdominal transplantation in a comprehensive fashion. Hence, the focus will be on the most commonly performed procedures, namely kidney and liver transplantation. Triggered by the lack of large definitive studies, we intentionally raise controversial points, and some readers may disagree with some of the conclusions. However, these disagreements are a reflection of the paucity of adequate data for some of the discussed topics.